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Review by dave See Profile

  • Location: Littleton, Middlesex, MA, USA
  • Cost: $160 per month (24 month contract)
It's good enough
Bundling, price
Pre Sales Information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)

Longstanding Fios customer since early 2000s.

The Fios network service is decently reliable, but is in my opinion overpriced especially for the higher speeds. I recently renewed, and the pricing structure seemed to be such that it's not really worth getting just an internet package, so I went for a 'triple play' bundle with the laughably-misnamed 'custom' channel selection, which is essentially a prix-fixe menu of options. Final cost with fees, fees, and fees, is around $160 for 150Mb/s net, phone, TV, and a $10 'World Plan' international call package.

Of course, they have tempting packages for new customers with good pricing on gigabit rates, but are not at all concerned about extending decent pricing to existing customers. (And then the sales support rep opens the conversation with "thanks for being a loyal customer"...)

Note also that in the last year or so the video-on-demand service became unusable, and the advert-laden TV content has never been particularly good. So what I've actually got is reasonable but pricey networking, reasonable land-line phone service (with a good fix-price international calling option, important to me) and an averagely-crap TV service.



member for 23.8 years, 13222 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 5.8 years ago

JohnA4
Premium Member
join:2003-09-16
Pittsburgh, PA

JohnA4

Premium Member

DSL to FIOS


You're not supposed to disconnect or discontinue your DSL. It's all just migrated to your FIOS account. One would have thought you would have gotten some guidance in the FIOS forums, prior to needlessly complicating your service continuity. Enjoy
dave
Premium Member
join:2000-05-04
not in ohio

dave

Premium Member

Re: DSL to FIOS

I had two phone lines. I intentionally wanted a brief period with DSL on line 1 and FiOS on line 2, since I could not tolerate any loss of access (such as I could imagine happening if some glitch showed up during FiOS installation). In particular, I was using the net over my DSL link while the Verizon tech was installing FiOS.

Engineering caution: always have a backup plan.

Note only that, but I definitely wanted to be paying for only one phone number after the dust had settled, and I definitely wanted that phone number to be "line 2", not "line 1". Too many people know my number is line-2 for me to want to change.

Once I was happy with FiOS, I ordered line 1 service to be discontinued entirely. That's what took out the mailboxes.

I most assuredly did have to explicitly disconnect that phone service, otherwise I'd be paying ~$50/mo for a phone number I no longer wanted.

I understand that the S.O.P. would work well if I replaced DSL on one phone with FiOS on the same number, but that's not what I wanted. And naturally I checked with tech support that this could be done.

ITALIAN926
join:2003-08-16

ITALIAN926

Member

responsibility

You can be upset about Netflix all you want, but not even Netflix agrees entirely with you as they just made a huge deal with Comcast.

Netflix accounts for what? 50% + of all internet traffic, and only the last mile providers should be responsible for that cost? They are now talking about 4K video requiring 15mbps MINIMUM, and again, people like you believe its only up to the last mile providers to bend over backwards for Netflix? lets get real.

I wouldnt worry too much, Netflix is likely to make this type of deal with every major ISP, including Verizon.

McLovin
Chicka chicka yeah
Premium Member
join:2005-06-12
Fairbanks, AK

McLovin

Premium Member

Re: responsibility

Disagree. Netflix pays their peering providers for the transit bandwidth they need to serve their customers. Broadband customers pay their carriers for the bandwidth they need. The carriers should ultimately be responsible to serve the speeds customers are paying for regardless of what online service is demanding that bandwidth. Plain and simple.

ITALIAN926
join:2003-08-16

ITALIAN926

Member

Re: responsibility

Yes, and this debate can go on forever, yet Netflix is paying the cash. Oh well for that.